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I am fine tuning a tourny list (comp scores a plenty), and I am having issue on deciding on the last remaining points for some of the scouts.

The list has 5 pods with 2x greyhunters, wolfguard, 2x salamander flamer stuff, and some Thunderwolves, so a decent amount of close range punchy.

The scouts in question are part of a 10 man squad, 5 being snipers and the other 5 being ????.
- Do I go CCW and toss them in the lists Stormraven for end game assault objective (but dont I have a abundance of mediocre assault already?)
- Do I go bolters and give them the option to either be a bullet sponge for the snipers or possibly rapid fire out of the stormraven when the jump out?
- Or do I just go crazy and give them shotguns.

Shotguns are the “I can’t make up my mind” answer.

I’d go with a mix of CC and shotguns personally.

Personally, and this is just me, the only scouts I would consider using is snipers with a missle launcher. If the last 5 cant be snipers because you dont have the bits, I would either order the bits or slap some boltguns on them.

I just cant imagine CCW and pistol scouts ever really doing a whole lot, especially just 5.

Just my 2 cents.

The last 5 cant have snipers is because I am maxed out on points (I have something like 15 snipers, love the models and started out as ravenguard).

 Nevelon wrote:
Shotguns are the “I can’t make up my mind” answer.

I’d go with a mix of CC and shotguns personally.

Plus shotgun are something unique to scouts.

Are they wolf scouts or salamander scouts

Salamander scouts (here is the short breakdown of the list without all the bells and whistles)

SW
Wolf priest + 4 combi plas WG - pod
Greyhunter x10 - plas - pod
Greyhunter x10 - Melta - pod
Thunderwolves x3 - x1 SS

Salamander
Libby + Commandsquad - x4 flamer - apoc - pod
Assault Squad x5 - flamer - pod
Stormraven - MM/ASS

and then the aforementioned scouts.

*it should be mentioned that the scouts have also been budgeted to have camo cloaks.

A ccw & bp scout unit is often overlooked by opponents if you have other dangerous assault units around I find, which has often worked to my advantage by getting a meltabomb or power sword in the right place at the right time.
Once I had a scout squad (the sarge really) take out a wave serpent, a fire dragon squad, a guardian squad, a dreadnought, and take another serp down to its last hp all in one game (the sarge was the only model I had left standing alongside a wounded lemartes). Annecdotal I know, but their mediocrity in opponents eyes is their biggest advantage.

I'd say, with the camo cloaks, give em bolters and keep em in reserve. Outflank to grab or contest a late objective.

Shotguns

CCW vs Shotgun:
One extra shot before assault, or one extra attack in CC. I generally think the extra attack in CC is more valuable, if only because they greatly increase your chance of breaking and sweeping the enemy.


...but I usually give my scouts boltguns and camo cloaks. They're scoring units who infiltrate/outflank/scout/move through cover, and who can get 2+ cover saves when they go to ground, and have mediocre combat stats. They shouldn't be getting into CC unless you're doing some LS Storm shenanigans (the cerebus launcher's blind + heavy flamer + drive-by shootings with your shotguns followed up by an assault is awesome and hilarious).

Think about it this way with a shotgun a scout gets 2 S4 AP- Shots and then 2 S4 AP- hits in close combat. with a Pistol/CCW combo, you get 1 S4 AP5 shot, and 3 S4 AP- hits in close combat. Same number of S4 attacks either way, but with the pistol you at least get some with an AP value. Granted AP5 is nothing to write home about, but still.

The shotgun also gets the hits in during the shooting phase. Scout CC attacks happen after overwatch, and after initiative steps 10-5. There is ample time for a scout to be killed in that time.

Also, if you are camping an objective with your scouts, the shotgun lets you get some shots in on nearby things (although not as good as a bolter, but better then a pistol) and more overwatch shots.

Youd be surprised what CC scouts can do.

3 of em killed my 3 remaining bike troopers in melee and and cost me a game.

I once killed old one eye with 5 ccw scouts

Even with BS3 I think Scouts are better off shooting than trying to fight in CC. Anything that 5 Scouts can beat in CC will probably be just as easily killed by 5 Scouts with Bolters in cover and blasting away.

I'd say run them 4 Bolters and a HB and let them either soak wounds for your Snipers while plinking away or hop out of your Stormraven and hose down an enemy objective holder with Bolter fire.

In your situation where tactical flexibility is a priority, you can't get better than Bolter Scouts. They can stand on your gunline and shoot, or hop out of a Raven and take contest or clear objectives. CC Scouts would struggle to do either.

 UltraTacSgt wrote:
Even with BS3 I think Scouts are better off shooting than trying to fight in CC. Anything that 5 Scouts can beat in CC will probably be just as easily killed by 5 Scouts with Bolters in cover and blasting away.

I'd say run them 4 Bolters and a HB and let them either soak wounds for your Snipers while plinking away or hop out of your Stormraven and hose down an enemy objective holder with Bolter fire.

In your situation where tactical flexibility is a priority, you can't get better than Bolter Scouts. They can stand on your gunline and shoot, or hop out of a Raven and take contest or clear objectives. CC Scouts would struggle to do either.

Not necessarily. For example, the fire dragons and guardians I mentioned above were killed in the sweep. It would have taken bolter scouts a long long time to break either of those units. Whereas sweeping gets rid of entire units in one go. Something shooting cannot do. When applied against the right target, ccw scouts can be more effective. However, I doubt I would drop a raven into hover to allow a 55/90pt scout unit to assault and against the majority of targets, bolter scouts are indeed more tactically flexible as you say.

I've fielded scouts ever since the new codex came out in all of their forms. The CC scouts are the only ones that truly impressed me. Snipers are great for holding objectives but have poor damage output. Bolter scouts are even worse. Even in rapid fire range 10 scouts will usually only score 10 hits. Against MEQ that's maybe 5 wounds. Not very impressive. Shotgun scouts aren't much better. However 10 scouts with ccw will get 10 shots plus 3 attacks on the charge. My scouts have ruined targets that cost many more points. My last game I had one unit of them kill a maulerfiend, a rhino, and 8 plague marines. They then pushed towards the relic. Not bad for 110 points. If you keep them cheap they can work wonders and you can field a lot of them. Also like others have said they don't appear threatening until they are stuck in.

If given the choice i'd say bolter scouts

Turn em into Wolf scouts, CCW and give on MOTW

a D6+1 attack with rending is a pretty nasty surprise to have pop up.

Eihnlazer wrote:
Youd be surprised what CC scouts can do.

3 of em killed my 3 remaining bike troopers in melee and and cost me a game.

They are good enough to kill off other race's troops. Fire Warriors and Guardians will fall to them just fine.

The nice thing about scout squads is that they have Move Through Cover, and are cheap enough to stuff into a Stormraven without compromising its role as a gunship. Combined with the Raven's cheap locator beacon, this lets you drop the squad risk-free and exactly where you need it in the later turns of a game without having to switch to Hover mode. Even if the Raven gets intercepted, you're not out an outrageous amount of points for the transported squad, and it's theoretically possible someone might survive the crash.

If you're running scouts this way, I'd recommend either shotguns or CCWs, since you may have to charge an objective on the turn after you drop if the game hasn't ended yet. You might also wish to invest in camo cloaks, to make them that much more durable when weathering return fire after a drop or from overwatch.